Some distance of showmanship!
No, only the pallid trail
The North Winter to follow the red sun of the South and begin.
Center of imploding dreams: my self.
Collar for parading memes: the house built of wattle,
The flight of geese in a straggling arrow.
Time piece of open sea and trail,
Pisces and Scorpio making dim path,
To the promise of mother’s far North,
The hunting ground and Aurora roost
Where the nest of the night is flamboyant, dreamy,
Not yet accomplished.

The state of flux between this and that rides
the knife blade of a moment,
Separating hide from fat, this from that.
Her supple skin and his rough touch,
The apple from the tongue, old from young.

The puzzle pieces made of wood,
The scattered leaves on the forest floor,
The agile, quick wits of birds and squirrels rummaging.
We found it here in memory once,
Half covered in melting snow.

We buried her here when she lost her child and
Both of them died
As now the wind dies, the ice goes back to water.
Even on a still night you can hear the rumblings,
The freeze and toss of ice chunks in the river
Like undigested scat, the coyote wisdom,
The owl’s fateful disappearance.
People can’t make it alone.

No one was here before us,
No one will come after us as we wade into the water
Or walk into the woods alone,
Alert for signs,
Smelling the salt and damp of movement
from here to the next now, gone.
She lay by the hill,
Eyes to the sky.

By Rolf Stavig